My Father married a Korean woman when he was there in the war, brought her to America and they had two sons together - Steve in 1956 and Dave in 1958/9. She left him for another Korean man she met in Los Angeles and went to Korea with him leaving her two sons with my Dad. Unfortunately my Dad decided he could not provide them with the best care so he gave them both up for adoption. I believe they were 2 and 4 at the time. A few years later he met my Mother and had myself and my brother. Last year he passed away and I’ve been trying to decide if it’s a good idea to search for my half brothers.
They do not know I or my brother exist, which is the scary part. Would it be best if I just left it alone? As far as I know they have never searched for their father or they would have found out about myself and my brother.
I don’t want to disrupt their lives but on the other hand maybe they would like to know they have more family out there?
I am trying to think this through from your brothers perspective. I would be pissed at my parents from keeping me from my family but I would definately want to know my brothers.If I was you I would do it.
When I was 18 years old, I found out that I had a half sister quite by accident. I went on a double date with her. She was not my date (I was with her friend) but her mom misunderstood and thought she was going out with me and told her I was her half brother. Then my half-sister told me and I confronted my mother about it. Turns out I have–get this–at least 8 half-siblings. Papa Was a Rolling Stone! The revelation drove a wedge between my mother and me that we are only now overcoming fifteen years later. I felt betrayed and lied-to by both of my parents, which was very disconcerting, since I was only used to feeling betrayed and lied-to by my father.
I made a point of trying to contact some of the other half-siblings. I got to four before I quit. Ultimately, it was an unrewarding exercise in self-flagellation. I don’t keep in touch with any of them. I had nothing in common with them, and nothing to talk about.
I don’t know what kind of lessons you can learn from my experience, but there it is. As with everything else in life, I would chose knowing over not-knowing. But don’t expect to strike up an instant familial bond with them.
Ask yourself what you want from the searching, the finding, and the subsequent relationship. Then ask if any of these things are realistic, reset your expectations, and see what you come up with.
Its possible your brothers will bear a lot of resentment to you. They may hate your father. Or they may want a relationship with you - your ability to fill them in on the past may fill a lot of holes for them.
There are counselors that specialize in birthfamily issues - you might want to talk to someone with some experience in this before you search, and it may be helpful to have the contact if your search is successful.
I’m going to go against the grain here and suggest you leave well enough alone.
The story sounds horrible to me. (I know of a similar family, where the kids got abandoned in a foreign country because the parents were more into doing their own thing than into taking care of their own children. The children of course turned out extremely messed up, and in at least one case wound up doing basically the same thing with their children.)
I can’t imagine the pain of knowing my own parents abandoned me. Maybe those brothers are living under the false impression that something less nasty happened – they might think their mother died, instead of ditching them for a stranger.
I’m sorry if my language is harsh but a very harsh thing happened to those boys. Perhaps knowing you would make their lives better, but I can think of a million possibilities where knowing you even exist would make their lives much worse. Pray for them, and let them find you if they want to (as you said, if they decide to look for their/your father, they’ll find you at that time.)
About seven years ago, I found out I have a half brother. My father, when he was 18 or so, had a pretty serious relationship with a girl. After she became pregnant, her family moved her away and demanded she cease contact with my dad.
The only reason I ever found out about this is because my dad was crying one day. Turns out his son’s mother died, and he told me all about. He has another kid, too. A girl, he thinks, but there’s no way to find her.
It’d be fairly easy for me to find this guy. He’s a Junior, so I already know his full name. He’s in the Army, too. He knows that my dad’s married with 4 kids. He talked to my dad a few times after his mother died.
I guess I have an interest in meeting him, but nothing that’s keeping me up at night. I have my family. My family has always been 2 parents, 3 siblings, a sister and two brothers. I don’t feel incomplete not knowing this guy, and I’m not really pissed at my parents, either. My mom didn’t even know about him until she wanted to name her first son after my dad. Obviously, that wasn’t going to work and my dad told her. IIRC, that’s the first she ever heard of it. I’ll double check with her though, to make sure I have my facts straight.
If I ever did meet him, I don’t think I’d pursue a real relationship with him, simply because I’ve lived over 2 decades without him. He doesn’t know me, and I don’t know him. We share a bit of DNA, that’s all.
I don’t have any advice for you because your situation is far different from mine. Just do what feels right. Good luck.
It happened to my dad. He knew about his younger half siblings but they didn’t know about him until many, many years after their shared father died. They didn’t know about dad because their father was still married to my grandma after all of them were born, although he pretended to be married to their mother. Nobody wanted to tell them their dad was a bigamist and they were bastards. One of their aunts spilled the beans to the siblings and they quite promptly contacted my dad. Let me tell you, it was the most wonderful thing that ever happened to my dad. There was no resentment on anybody’s side - not my grandma, not their mother and not any of the siblings, not the lied to younger ones and not my abandoned dad. The mothers have since died, but there is such love among all of them. My dad is a minister and had performed marriage ceremonies for more than one nephew. They see each other often, even though they live all over the country.
Don’t forget the “boys” in question are 48 and 46-years-old.
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Pray for them, and let them find you if they want to (as you said, if they decide to look for their/your father, they’ll find you at that time.)[/QUOTE
dreamer’s feelings are just as important as his brothers. If he wants to find them he should. At this point in their middle age I doubt being contacted will throw their lives into a tail-spin. Maybe they won’t be interested to make long time commitment as family.Maybe they are schmucks that you won’t want to know. There is no way to know without trying.
You can’t know in advance whether it could disturb them or at the countrary mightily please them. Given they’re adults, I would suspect that, at worst, they won’t care about you.
So, since you’re interested in meeting them, I’d go ahead, I were you, and try to find them.
There’s a few things that keep running in my mind about whether I should do this or not. First off though Loach, I’m a she not a he
My Father was never a good Father although towards the end he at least tried to be. There aren’t a whole lot of good things to tell about him if I were to meet my half brothers. He himself never wanted to look for them, I think that was because he had tremendous guilt over giving them up, and the reason he passed away at 70 was because he didn’t care about his life anymore and totally let himself go. Also my real Brother is not someone that I can say a lot of positive things about either. He’s been in and out of prison his entire life and now, at 40 he’s once again in rehab.
The reason I want to find them is probably a selfish one being that my family is very small, so knowing that there are two grown men out there who I am related too and could possibly become friends with, appeals to me. I would also like to know if I have some half nieces or nephews out there somewhere.
I like Dangerosa’s idea of a birthfamily counselor, but I’m sure that can be expensive.
I would go for it, but be prepared for the worst. Their mother is probably dead, and so is their birth father, both of whom abandoned them. (Yeah, your dad was trying to do the right thing, but right or wrong, being given up for adoption at age 4 is a heck of a lot different than being adopted when you’re 4 days old.) They may have anger issues that they may take out on you, because Dad went on his merry way and created you and never bothered with them again. There might be some jealousy there.
Not that they should take it out on you, I’m just sayin’.
Or, it could be that they’ll be thrilled to know that they’ve got siblings that they’ve never known about. They may have had such wonderful adoptive families that they don’t have time to be bitter because your dad giving them up for adoption was the best thing that ever happened to them. (It could happen, I spose.)
I’d write them a letter. Say your piece and tell them that you’re there when/if they want to meet, but you understand if they don’t want to. (Send it certified so you’ll know they got it.)
I just wanted to thank everyone for your advice and comments. I haven’t actually found them yet, but when/if I do, I will think long and hard about what to say in that letter. It will be a tough one to write.
He’s in the Army, too. He knows that my dad’s married with 4 kids. He talked to my dad a few times after his mother died.